Wednesday, July 28, 2004

LIttle scion little thing, lovely knowing lovely dream.

I have a job. Got it today. I start tomorrow, 5 o'clock. I'm going to be a bus boy at The Steak Buffet.

No, I'm not excited. Yes, it'll be nice to have money. But I plan on saving as much as I can, because I'll need it later. Why am I not excited you ask? Well, no one wants to work for 50 years of their life. . .neither do I.

No, I don't have a girlfriend. Yes, I've continued exercising, but I was stymied for about a week because my left foot was hurting. I jogged for the first time in a while today; while my foot was hurting I walked.

I've been busy, that's why I've been away. It's good to get off her a while anyway. There's more important things than the internet.

Where did I go? I was at Dickinson for about a week, with my Grandparents. My Grandpa went on his trip to Alaska, so I stayed with my Grandma in Dickinson. She had my brother there, as well as my cousin Shelby, so I stayed to help my Grandma.

I have decided never to have kids. Being up there has shown me how ignorant, base, innocent (in an ignorant, stupid way), annoying, bothersome, arrogant, and above all childish children are. Yes, I used to be one, but I don't remember my childhood much. Only a few facts, that's it. That part of my life--my childhood--seems like a different person, I've changed so much.

I will only have kids when I am fifty years old or so. Then is the ripe time to do that.

Yes, I've been listening to music. I bought The Doors Legacy for $27.00 recently. I don't know if it was worth it yet. Quite expensive for two CDs, but then again The Wall was up in that price range, too.

I listened to Wilco's A Ghost Is Born more. I want to get some of their earlier albums now. I recommend A Ghost Is Born. The album is spare and earthly, spiritual and quiet, soothing and quaint. The songs sound sometimes unsure where to go on, as if improvised right there on the spot. But throughout it all, there is a feeling of personal touches--and it feels right.

While at Dickinson, my Grandma took me to this used bookstore they have there. It is a haven there. I bought many, many books for outrageously cheap prices.

I got Angela's Ashes, by Frank McCourt, and I read it. It won the Pulitzer Prize, and was made into a Motion Picture. It is a memoir to the Irish Christian Childhood which Frank had. It is grim, harrowing. It is about the self-perpetuating power of the human being. The way it is written is triumphant, and despite what doleful things it has to say, there is a desperate humor which livens it all up. And the ending is sunshine, blithe warming sunshine.

That book is recommended.

I also read The Bad Place by Dean Koontz. When I first started it, I was very taken by Koontz's writing style; he's one of the best writers, when he's good, I've ever read.

The main problem I have with his writing is his overdescription. For example, he describes houses in ornate detail every chance he gets. Does this further the book in any way? No, it does the exact opposite.

Otherwise, I was impressed by him. When his writing's good, it's good. Some of the most enjoyable I've read.

I'd recommend that book, too. I liked it for the ending. I won't give it away, but I really like Candy's character, and the entire backstory of his family. It made getting to the end of the book worth it.

Right now I'm reading The Autobiography of Malcolm X. I've known how the blacks were treated, how they went through slavery, then segregation, but this book has really shown it in even more detail to me.

For four hundred years the black man was prejudiced against by the white man. The white man took the black man from his African homeland, as slaves. The white man raped, beat, bruised, battered, mistreated the black man. The black man was thrown into America, ignorant to the fact of their real homeland, and that they had just as much rights as the white man, and were equal in every way.

For four hundred years the black man has went through this.

It is still going on today, here in America, but to a lesser extent. But it is still there.

This book has shown me why some black men are mad with whites as it is.

Malcolm X himself is amazing. Here's a man who did a complete three-sixty. He used to be a hustler, he used to pimp, peddle dope and other drugs. He used to do burgulary. He used to take large amounts of drugs, be high all the time.

Then he was sent to prison. When in prison, he found the Muslim Religion.

He did not know anything. He read books, but did not understand them, because he only knew the slang he had gotten in his hustling days in Harlem, in New York.

He then, in prison, took a dicionary, and page-by-page went through it, writing each word down, and its meaning, until he had an understanding of words and what they meant.

Then he read, and read, and read. He got the education he couldn't have gotten from the white man himself, from books.

And from there, he became the most dynamic leader of what was the Black Revolution.

And then he was killed by an assassin's bullet for all he had done.

Just like JFK was, like Robert Kennedy was, like Martin Luther King Jr. was. All in the same era--the turbulent '60's.

Well, I'm calling it a night. I'm nervous about my job tomorrow. I'm afraid this will be a redux of KFC. But I vow to myself I'm going to do my job with pride, with cunning, with want. I am going to keep this job.
Comments (4)